


Second Chances

by FlowerFaerie



Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Gen, Introspection, Past Life Memories, Reincarnation, Reincarnation Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:08:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27280951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FlowerFaerie/pseuds/FlowerFaerie
Summary: When Kagome returns to the Feudal Era and begins living as a priestess after marrying InuYasha, she begins to acquire memories of her past life as Kikyo. This is a study of how those memories affect her and her relationship with InuYasha. No beta we die like men.Also I’m gonna be honest with y’all, the plot of this fic is held together with duct tape and staples and makes no sense whatsoever because I’m tired and can’t write. I apologize in advance.
Relationships: Higurashi Kagome & Kaede, Higurashi Kagome & Kikyou, Higurashi Kagome/InuYasha, InuYasha/Kikyou (InuYasha), Kaede & Kikyou (InuYasha)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 20





	Second Chances

**Author's Note:**

> This started as a speculation post on Tumblr centered around “what if Kagome started remembering her life as Kikyo” and it turned into an entire fic. I hope it’s at least somewhat decent.

It starts off small, like knowing the name of an herb she hadn’t actually been taught about yet, or knowing the way to a place she’s never been, things that can easily be written off as coincidence. After a while, it gets slightly eerie as she starts remembering things that happened in the village long before she arrived, but it’s never anything significant, just little things like someone’s birthday or the place someone else got married. She continues brushing it off until one morning, when she’s half asleep and calls one of Sango’s daughters Kaede. At that point, she’s quite fed up with the entire thing, and goes to Kaede herself for answers. It doesn’t take long for the old priestess to figure out what’s going on, and she informs Kagome that there’s not much she can do except deal with it.

She’s frustrated, of course, but deal with it she does. It’s not that bad, really. The memories aren’t terribly intrusive and they’re rare, so she can usually forget she even has them, but they keep getting stronger. She remembers more details, and longer periods of time. Eventually, Sango persuades her to tell InuYasha about it, and she does, albeit reluctantly. She’s surprised by how well he takes it, and how quickly they come up with a solution. They agree to not try and cover it up or ignore it, but also to keep affirming that she’s Kagome, not anyone else. She knows he’s remembering Kikyo every time it happens, though, and rather than making her jealous like it did before, it just makes her sad. She’s happy with her life, she really is, but there’s a niggling feeling in the back of her mind that says she doesn’t deserve this, that she’s stealing it from Kikyo, who should have been able to live in peace with InuYasha, just like this. Her anger towards the other woman faded out a while ago, and now that she’s beginning to really understand how she must have felt, she wishes that there was a way to give her a second chance, but there isn’t. Kikyo is dead, and nothing will change that.

Life goes on, and if Kagome makes Kaede’s favorite dish for her birthday, one she hasn’t had since she was a little girl, well, there’s no need to tell anyone that it was any more than a coincidence. It’s the same when she starts wearing lip paint, or when she asks InuYasha if he’d like to go canoeing with her. She lets the wrong word slip one time, calling out “beloved” instead of “sit,” and steadfastly refuses to tell anyone why. When she sits with Inuyasha, neither one of them saying anything, she sometimes feels herself drifting off, as if she’s floating between her two lives, but just as always she tells no one. The couple down the street have no idea when they told Kagome their birthdays, but she’s not inclined to answer them. She doesn’t want to let anyone outside of her small extended family know what’s happening, and jealously guards her secret. She’s not really sure why she doesn’t want anyone to know, but it’s a near obsessive urge, so she doesn’t fight it. It’s easier to keep quiet, she tells herself, because this way she won’t have to explain anything. The memories are easy to deal with anyway. It’s the guilt and sadness that’s hard. She just can’t push it away, no matter how hard she tries, and it’s the one thing she won’t tell InuYasha. He just wouldn’t understand it, the way she feels like she’s taken the life that Kikyo deserved away from her. If Naraku has never turn them apart, they would be living like this, happy and at peace, just like normal lovers, and it makes her heart ache when she gets those tiny glimpses of another time, another woman so different from herself but also so very much alike.

She finally tells Kaede about her feelings one day, after she realizes that she needs to tell  _ somebody _ , before she drives herself crazy keeping all of this inside her head. Kaede is, admittedly, out of her depth here. She has no idea how to help Kagome deal with these feelings, except to tell her that she doesn’t need to feel guilty because what happened to Kikyo wasn’t her fault. It takes her a while to figure out something that might help, but after a few days, she decides to build a small shrine to her sister at the base of the Tree of Ages. Kikyo’s original grave had been destroyed, and she hadn’t left a body behind the second time she’d died, so no one really felt the need to make another one, but Kaede hopes that having a place to remember her, a place where both Kagome and InuYasha can go to sort through their emotions, will help. Secretly, she also hopes it will help her too. She never did stop grieving for her beloved older sister. The shrine does help, thankfully, and she notices that it seems to be being used as intended. Kagome spends long periods of time there, talking to a dead woman without a hint of irony, because she’d go insane if she didn’t. She tells Kikyo that she’s sorry, that she wishes she’d had this chance at happiness as well, and that she’ll take care of InuYasha for her, among other things. It seems to help, until she gets pregnant with InuYasha’s child.

It turns out pregnancy hormones are the least of her problems, because her spiritual abilities suddenly begin to go a little haywire. The things that happen during the day, like her arrow burning itself to nothing before it reaches the target, or being forced to call Miroku for help after an exorcism goes horribly wrong, are bearable, if incredibly annoying. It’s the  _ dreams _ that make her want to curl up in a ball and never leave her bed again. She dreams of Kikyo, always Kikyo, because their connection has strengthened to the point where she barely knows where Kikyo ends and Kagome begins. Sometimes she’s kind and gentle, congratulating Kagome on her child and reassuring her that she’s not angry at her for living in peace with InuYasha. Those are nice dreams, dreams that she actually enjoys, but they’re unfortunately rare. Most of the time she’s wild and frightening, acting all too much like she did when she’d first been resurrected. She mocks Kagome for ever daring to think that she’s anything more than an imposter, and snarls viciously at her when she vows to never forgive her for having InuYasha’s child when it should have been  _ her _ . When she goes to her grave with him, to lay flowers at the shrine and tell Kikyo that she’s having a baby, she remembers the dreams and refuses to look up, afraid that she’ll see her face, twisted with rage and hatred. When Kaede lays a hand on her swollen belly during her weekly checkups, and her eyes glaze over with something she can’t identify, she flinches, convinced that she’ll condemn her for daring to have this baby, this happiness, and as time goes on she starts to realize that she’s not very happy at all. It’s hard to focus on living her life when part of her is constantly living in the past, and she hates it. She starts to think that maybe it would be better if she’d never fallen in love with InuYasha at all.

Kagome’s eight months pregnant when it happens, and her belly is swollen to an obscene degree. She and InuYasha are relaxing in bed, discussing baby names. They’ve already decided on Toga for a boy, but they just can’t agree on a name for a girl, and she’s starting to feel annoyed. She closes her eyes and tries to block out his indignant objections, and a memory seizes her exhausted mind. She’s suddenly standing on the banks of a river, shyly asking InuYasha if he’d ever consider having a child with her. He turns bright red, and begins to stutter madly, and she turns away, silently berating herself for ever asking. Of course he wouldn’t want to, she was stupid to hope. But when he finally gets over himself and answers, she turns back around, surprised. He’d said yes, to her astonishment, and she felt a surge of pure joy. Someday, after InuYasha became human, the two of them would have a child, and she would be free to live as an ordinary woman. When she snaps out of it, coming back to herself, she breaks, bursting into tears. She was such a disgrace. She’d stolen their dreams, their hopes for a future. She’d fallen headfirst down a well and taken the place of a stranger, and she had the nerve to believe that she deserved it. She doesn’t think about Naraku, or about the Shikon Jewel’s twisted promises. She doesn’t even think about how this isn’t like her, how she’d usually confront her imsecurities head on. She’s tired, and her back hurts, and the guilt has been eating at her ever since she’d returned to the Feudal Era, and at that point, she stops being rational and just lets herself cry. InuYasha holds her, positioning himself behind her and wrapping his arms around her just the way she likes it. He’s learned that when a woman cries during pregnancy, it’s probably not for any particular reason, so he doesn’t ask. He just stays quiet, and hopes that she’ll feel better soon, but she doesn’t. She stops crying, but even then she doesn’t want to talk to him anymore, so she slips outside, walking down to Kikyo’s shrine in the cool night air.

She isn’t particularly surprised to see Kaede there, since the priestess visits this place to remember her sister quite often, but she can’t help but wish she would just go away, despite how rude it was. She doesn’t bother trying to hide her tears, the old woman always  _ knows _ exactly how she’s feeling anyway, and just leans up against the old tree, feeling thoroughly miserable. She needs to tell him, she says, a knowing expression on her face, and Kagome merely sighs. She doesn’t want to tell InuYasha about her guilt. She was sure he’d take it the wrong way or completely misunderstand. Kaede reminds her that he’s come a long way since they’d met, and that she might be surprised by how well he did understand. Then she confesses that she’s almost certain that InuYasha is also feeling some measure of guilt, just like her, and Kagome sighs again. Oh well, she’s having his baby, she might as well be honest with him. She thanks Kaede and returns home, flopping inelegantly onto the bed. She’s so tired nowadays, she just wants to have this baby and get this ordeal over with. She drifts between sleep and wakefulness, thinking about what she’ll name her child if it’s a girl. It will be a strong child, a fighter who never gives up. They’ll teach it to use weapons and whatever demonic or spiritual abilities it might inherit, to make sure that it’s never left unprepared. Their child will be born into a family who will do anything to protect it, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t know how to protect itself. 

The next day, she finally confides in InuYasha, telling him all about the dreams and the guilt and the reason she’d been crying the night before. In turn, he tells her his own secret insecurities. He worries that he’s replacing Kikyo, and that as much as he loves her and their little child, he can’t help but be a little afraid that she’d be upset with him. Neither of them are really able to comfort the other, but just the fact that they were able to talk about it now lifts a huge weight off their shoulders, and, looking back on it, she thinks that maybe their child was waiting for this, because a few minutes later, there’s water pooling around her feet and she suddenly understands why her back pain has been so much worse lately. Her daughter is born a few hours later, the labor quick and intense. She’s glad that it only took a little while, because she’s absolutely spent and she’s certain that she wouldn’t have been able to endure a longer labor, but when she holds her daughter in her arms for the first time, she promptly realizes that she’d go through a thousand hours of labor for this tiny creature, because there has never been a more perfect being in all the world. She coos softly to the girl, and belatedly realizes that they never did come up with a name for a girl. Eventually, they dub her Moroha, meaning double-edged, and while everyone else thinks it’s a reference to weapons, both of them know what it really means. They’re happier than they’ve ever been, but even now, there’s a hint of sadness tainting that joy. 

Moroha is a delight of a child. She’s smart as a whip and endlessly energetic, smiling and laughing near-constantly, and even though her tantrums are truly terrifying, they’re thankfully uncommon and short-lived. She looks human, but there’s an undeniable demon-ness to her personality, even when she’s still an infant. When she’s about a week old, they take her down to Kikyo’s shrine. Neither of them are sure why, since it isn’t like Kikyo can actually see her, but they don’t bother to question it by now. Instead, they happily announce that she’s healthy and strong, and promise the scarred bark that they’d tell her all about her honorary aunt. It helps them to feel better, so they don’t really care if it makes them look crazy. The ones that matter most understand, after all. They introduce her to Sango’s children, and the twins, Kin’u and Gyokuto, can’t get enough of her. Hisui is less interested, but he even he has to admit that she’s cute. After her parents, the one that seems happiest to meet Moroha is Rin, to the surprise of absolutely no one. She promptly announces herself to be her favorite aunt, and insists on taking care of her to the best of her ability. She even talks Sesshomaru into holding her, and Kagome will forever be grateful for the mental image of the grumpy demon awkwardly holding a baby, clearly not sure how he felt about her. They keep their promise, and tell Moroha all about Kikyo, taking her down to the shrine to lay down flowers and discuss her various milestones, and she grows up with a sense of respect and love for the woman her father loved so long ago.

Overall, their life in the village is a happy one, but Kagome soon finds herself growing restless. When Moroha is weaned, she and InuYasha begin taking short trips away from home, leaving their daughter under the care of Kaede and the ever caring and enthusiastic Rin. They never leave for more than three to five days, and they keep their trips relatively scarce so that she won’t feel abandoned, but they can’t quite contain their wanderlust. Finally, when Moroha is five, they decide that she’s old enough to go with them, and after a going-away party thrown by their dear friends, they set off on an extended vacation, to see the world together with their beloved little girl. She picks up survival skills very quickly, her intelligence and attentiveness paying off dramatically, and it isn’t long before she’s killed her first hare, and they celebrate by cooking it into a stew. It’s a bit difficult to convince her to walk upright, as she’s always preferred to run on all fours, but otherwise she acts human enough to get along in the various villages they visit, though when they’re alone all bets are off. She adores imitating her father’s demon habits, and pesters Kagome to teach her how to shoot sacred arrows. She has some of her mother’s spiritual abilities, but her control is negligible, making her slow to pick up the nuances of actually using it, but she tries hard. That’s really all that Kagome cares about, and she tells her as much. Her clever, determined little girl is the light of her life, and she couldn’t care less if she has any spiritual power or demonic abilities. Just the fact that she exists is enough. 

When Kagome’s having trouble sleeping, she lays awake in their tent with Moroha curled up next to her, thinking about various things. On that particular night, she thinks about Kikyo. It’s funny, how she dominates her mind far more when she’s dead than she ever had when she was alive. The dreams have stopped, to her immense relief, but the ever present memories are still around. The thoughts usually come after telling Moroha a story about her, but now they’re coming from a different source. InuYasha has confessed to wanting another child, and honestly, so does she, but she’s scared of getting pregnant. She’s scared that the dreams and the guilt and the horrific depression will come back. She knows now that it won’t be forever, and that she’ll have InuYasha and Kaede and everyone else to help her, but she isn’t sure if she can handle that again. She looks over at her daughter, and thinks of her husband keeping watch outside, and sighs softly. Moroha would love a sibling, and it isn’t like they planned to wander the Earth forever. They had to go home eventually. Besides, the second child couldn’t possibly be harder than the first one. As she drifts off to sleep, she decides to tell InuYasha that they can start trying for a second child tomorrow. 

It doesn’t take her nearly as long to get pregnant this time, but they don’t go back to Kaede’s village immediately. They want to enjoy their vacation a little while longer, and let Moroha get to know her sibling in private for a few months. When Kagome starts showing, they start traveling shorter distances each day, and choosing easier terrain, but she refuses to stop traveling even when it becomes difficult. After all, it was widely accepted in the Modern Era that exercise was good for the baby. Moroha takes to the news like a fish to water, talking to her sibling and constantly asking about them, and she even listens intently to the sanitized version of how babies were made, which Kagome is very glad for. Just as before, her spiritual abilities go on the fritz, forcing her to be very cautious with them, but the dreams are much rarer than before. It seems as if making her peace with the past has made her mind settle down, but they don't go away entirely, just like the underlying feelings. This time around, she can talk freely about it with InuYasha, which definitely helps, and she’s glad to have a shoulder to cry on when the hormones make even the most benevolent dreams too much to handle. One night, after she cried for nearly two hours, Moroha had tried to make tea for her. She’d completely bungled it and the tea was pretty much undrinkable, but the thoughtful gesture was enough to make her cry again, much to her daughter’s consternation. She’s seven months pregnant and stubbornly refusing to go back to the village when they receive a message that silences her arguments and has all of them rushing back home as quickly as possible. Kaede is very ill, and will probably die soon. 

When they return to the village, Kagome bursts into tears yet again upon seeing the old priestess lying in bed, too weak to get up on her own, and Kaede gently comforts her. She’s not upset or afraid, rather the opposite. She’s at peace with her death, having lived a long, fulfilling life. It’s comforting to know that she’s feeling alright, and Kagome knows that she’s elderly even by modern standards, but it doesn’t really help anyone feel better. Rin refuses to leave her side, and it’s already obvious that the coming loss will affect her badly, and they soon learn that Sesshomaru’s visits have been longer and more frequent, presumably to help her cope. Kagome’s heart aches for her, but there isn’t anything she can do to lessen the pain. Instead, she throws herself into making Kaede’s last days comfortable. She announces that she’s having another baby soon, even though it’s incredibly obvious by now, and the old woman is just as delighted as she had been the first time, caressing her belly with a look of almost childlike wonder. She makes her all of her favorite foods, and stays with her all night to make sure she’s comfortable. Kaede remains lucid as the days pass, but sometimes her memory slips a little bit and she begins speaking of things that happened long ago. It’s far from unexpected, but it doesn’t stop her from leaving the room to cry the first time she mistakes her for Kikyo. She doesn’t even feel annoyed like she usually does whoever someone mixes them up, she just feels a crushing grief because it reminds her that Kaede is dying and that soon she won’t be around anymore, and the thought of living in the village without her  _ hurts _ . She leaves briefly, heading to Kikyo’s shrine, and promises through tears that she’ll look after her baby sister, asking her to wait patiently because she misses her. 

Time goes on, and Kagome wonders if her feelings toward Kaede are entirely her own. It wouldn’t be surprising if some of the pain is coming from the ghost of Kikyo in her mind. But pain is pain, and she’s long since stopped caring why or how it occurred. She knows it’s time when Kaede asks to be taken to the Tree of Ages. The woman no longer looks fully alive, instead she looks fragile, almost translucent, and with her spiritual abilities it isn’t hard to tell that she’s passing from one life to the next. She obliges, and helps InuYasha, Miroku, and Sango get her onto a stretcher, telling Rin and Moroha to go ahead and prepare a bed for her. They reach the tree, and she’s struck by how beautiful the day is. It’s obvious that the world doesn’t know that such a precious person is dying. They lay her down on the makeshift bed, under the massive branches of the ancient tree, and settle down to wait. Kaede’s especially talkative today, and she privately wonders if her coming death is a relief, something that makes it easier to speak. She talks briefly about her life, but mostly, she talks about the people gathered around her. She tells them how proud she is of them, how glad she is to have known them all, and how they don’t need to feel sad because she will always watch over them. She talks about how it’s a blessing that her decline has been so peaceful, and that she’s never felt any pain or suffering, and says it’s all because she had them to take care of her. Kagome is surprised by her demeanor. Kaede is a prickly old woman, and often standoffish unless you were a young child, but now she’s acting like the stereotypical sweet granny. She supposed it’s to be expected, given that she’s literally dying, but she can’t help but let out a tiny giggle at the thought of her in an apron, holding a plate of cookies. She receives a sharp reprimand from the priestess, and is rather pleased to note that she hasn’t changed completely. 

Kaede fades out as the sun sets, and it’s so absurdly poetic that Kagome almost wonders if she’s dreaming, but she knows she isn’t. She hasn’t talked for quite some time, and neither has anyone else. Instead, they’ve all been quietly watching the sky as it changes colors. She lifts her head, and mumbles something that none of them can understand, and then she’s gone. They’re all perfectly still for a moment, silently processing the loss, until Rin lets out a piercing wail and clings desperately to the woman’s body, bursting into tears, and after that, she has no idea what happens because she’s dissolved into hysterical sobs herself. They take her back to the village for a proper funeral, and then bury her under the tree, near the little shrine. They discuss adding onto it, to make it a shrine to both sisters, and everyone agrees that it’s a good idea, but none of them have the energy at the moment. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Kagome knows that she should stay at home, because she’s very near to giving birth, but she goes to the shrine each day anyway, feeling larger and more cumbersome than ever before. It seems that fate has determined that she can’t have a child without feeling some kind of horrible emotions, and she fires and arrow at the tree in pure frustration, falling to her knees and crying out. She screams about how unfair it all is, that Kikyo never got a chance at happiness and that Kaede would never meet her second child and how much she hates all of it and just wishes that it would be over already, and because her eyes are closed, she misses the tiny orb of light that enters her body where her baby is, summoned by her intense emotions and the literal blaze of spiritual power surrounding her. 

It seems that the outburst gives her body the push it needed, because the minute she stands up she feels her water break and laughs at the absurdity of it all. She stumbles back to the village, grateful that it isn’t far, and allows Sango to mother her and cradles Moroha in her arms as InuYasha goes into worried father mode. She’s tired now, and there’s none of the excitement she felt the first time around. She just wants to get it over with, but it’s not to be, because soon after she gets settled down, a truly horrific pain tears through her body and she realizes that there’s blood between her legs, and all she can do is cry and beg the gods not to take her baby away from her. An hour later, the pain becomes so intense that she passes out, and even though she isn’t aware of it her body is shutting down. She’s very close to death, but she doesn’t really feel like she’s dying. Instead she feels peaceful, because there’s no pain or grief or fear or anything like that here. She can just float on air, and even though she knows she really needs to wake up, she doesn’t want to. It’s only when she hears a voice insistently calling her name, breaking through the fog of unconsciousness, that she reluctantly opens her eyes, and gasps aloud, sitting up. Kikyo is sitting in front of her, and she wants to ask how that’s even possible because she  _ is  _ Kikyo, but before she can even get a word out, the other woman begins talking. She sternly commands Kagome to wake up, because if she doesn’t she’ll die, and she isn’t going to accept that. She doesn’t really want to die, but she has so many things to say to her past self that she just can’t bring herself to leave, but she doesn’t get past the first sentence before there’s a finger on her lips. Kikyo’s smiling at her, and the look on her face is the same gentle, warm expression she sees in her best dreams, and she feels her body relax. She tells her that there’s no need to explain anything, because she’s been watching over them, and that there isn’t any need to keep harboring the feelings of guilt and regret. She’s happy to see them live their lives, she explains. She’s glad that InuYasha was able to find happiness, and she’s glad that her little sister was able to live a full life, and she loves Moroha with all her heart. She reassures her that Kaede has indeed passed on peacefully, and is watching over her at this very moment, but also tells her in no uncertain terms that she can’t see her yet, because she isn’t allowed to die. That snaps her out of her trance, and she shakes off the heavy veil of unconsciousness, sincerely thanking Kikyo for her help as she fades from view. Just before she wakes up, she finds herself wishing that there was a way for them both to find happiness. 

When she finally wakes up, she finds that her baby has miraculously survived, and she feels an indescribable surge of relief. She’s immediately embraced by her relieved husband and daughter, followed by her friends, and weakly hugs them back, feeling utterly exhausted but content. Her newest child is another little girl, she learns, and she’s rather intrigued to learn that she looks exactly like her mother, without even the smallest hint of her father in her. They haven’t decided on a name yet, but that’s okay, it can wait. All that matters now is that they’re alive and even though the baby is small and weak, she’s still a little fighter and Kagome is certain that she’ll overcome her traumatic birth to be a healthy child. She tells the others of what she’d seen while unconscious, and every one of them is convinced that it was more than a dream, that Kikyo had really been there. She agrees, because it had felt much more real than an ordinary dream, but she’s too tired to discuss it in detail. Instead, she simply holds her baby as everyone else leaves to give them family time, and lets InuYasha press against her on one side as Moroha curls up on her other side, admiring the fragile little thing. She opens her eyes, and both she and InuYasha gasp slightly. Her eyes are blue, like most newborns, but they are not the eyes of a child. Instead, they are heavy with such a powerful sense of purpose that it makes her look very old, and her parents recognize the expression immediately. She yawns, and the look vanishes, leaving her with the innocence of an ordinary baby, but there was no mistaking what they’d just seen. InuYasha reaches out to stroke her short black hair, his expression one of mixed awe and joy, and Kagome feels her eyes fill with tears of happiness this time. She knows exactly what to name her daughter now, because against all odds, it seems that her wish has been granted. She sighs contentedly, finally speaking out loud. “Welcome, Kikyo. We’re glad you’re here.”.


End file.
